Over the past year or so, I have ridiculed the new found push by some politicians towards decentralisation, noting that this is a pipe dream based on the settlement pattern of new migrants, which have overwhelmingly chosen to flood the major cities.

My view was initially based primarily on data from the Productivity Commission’s 2016 Migrant Intake into Australia report, which revealed that 86% of immigrants lived in the major cities of Australia in 2011 (mostly Sydney and Melbourne), whereas only 65% of the Australian-born population did:

Carly Jordan, a former international aid worker, was prompted by the ABC’s Australian Story to develop a sustainable model to bring migrants to Victoria.

Ms Jordan founded the Great South Coast Economic Migration Pilot as part of a regional leadership program…

One school in Hamilton is getting six new pupils through the scheme.

Mary-Ann Brown, Mayor of Southern Grampian Shire at Hamilton, said the region had good infrastructure, education and health but a declining or static population.

She said unemployment was low and there were opportunities for both unskilled and skilled migrants to work as farm labourers, joiners, nurses, doctors, accountants and solicitors.

A total of 187,000 international migrants have moved into regional areas between 2011 and 2016 helping to stop population decline at 151 Local Government Areas, according to the ABS 2016 Census.

The Regional Australia Institute said the new arrivals were helping provide stability to those communities, and ensuring long-term regional prosperity…

While I am happy for these regional areas, the fact remains that Australia’s immigration program has become more concentrated into the major cities than ever before.

The 2016 Census revealed that Australia’s population ballooned by 1.9 million people (+8.8%) in the five years to 2016, driven by a 1.3 million increase in new migrants:

So, according to the data quoted by the ABC above, only 14% (187,000) of migrants that arrived in Australia between 2011 and 2016 settled in regional areas, versus 86% of migrants (1.11 million) that settled in Australia’s cities. Indeed, as noted by the ABS:

In 2016, Sydney had the highest overseas-born population of all capital cities (1,773,496), followed by Melbourne (1,520,253) and Perth (702,545). The 2016 Census also reveals that those born overseas were more likely to live in a capital city (83%), a much higher percentage than people born in Australia.

Moreover, as noted by Tim Colebatch, the settlement pattern of new migrants into Sydney and Melbourne has become “extreme”:

It is striking how what we are seeing now differs from the first wave of postwar migration in the 1940s and early 50s. That wave was led by the British, the Dutch and the Germans, who spread right across the country and put down roots wherever they settled. Even now, the 2016 census finds that in New South Wales, 34 per cent of the British-born live outside Sydney, as do 37 per cent of Germans and 44 per cent of Dutch. Stunningly, so do 44 per cent of the Australian-born. In Victoria, the numbers are lower, but the pattern is similar.

But the second wave of migrants that followed, dominated by the Italians and Greeks, were more likely to form urban enclaves in the big cities. In Victoria, which attracted the largest share, only 10 per cent of Italian migrants and 3.4 per cent of Greeks now live outside Melbourne, much the same as a generation ago.

And the third wave of migration we are seeing now is almost completely city-centric. In Sydney on census night, the 224,685 Chinese migrants clearly outnumbered the 178,411 British – probably the first time in Australian history that British migrants have ever been outnumbered by another race in any capital city. But in the rest of New South Wales, with its 2.65 million people, the census found just 9578 Chinese migrants. Only 4.2 per cent of those in New South Wales live outside Sydney.

Sydney is also home to 96.3 per cent of the state’s Vietnamese-born population, 97.4 per cent of its Iraqi migrants, and 97.6 per cent of its Lebanese. That’s so different from the first wave of Lebanese migration a century or more ago, which spread out all over Australia, with some enterprising migrants buying horse and cart, fitting them out, and riding from station to station as the general stores of the outback.

Migrants to Victoria are similarly concentrated in Melbourne. The few square kilometres ruled by the Melbourne City Council houses four and a half times as many Chinese-born residents as the 210,000 square kilometres of regional Victoria, which includes cities like Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo. Melbourne is home to 97.2 per cent of Victoria’s Chinese migrants, 96.8 per cent of its Sri Lankans, 94.9 per cent of its booming Indian-born population, and 98.0 per cent of its Vietnamese…

Migrants usually flock to the cities. It’s natural that newcomers go where they have friends or family. But what we are seeing now is that natural tendency carried to extreme lengths. The difference between the racial makeup of electorates such as Melbourne and Wannon is like a difference between countries, rather than between parts of one region. Their human makeups have little in common. It’s not surprising that their political views also have little in common.

The above data should put to rest the misguided notion that Australia could maintain a mass immigration ‘Big Australia’ policy but somehow spread settlement throughout Australia, thereby taking pressure off Sydney and Melbourne.

The reality is that maintaining mass immigration means that Sydney and Melbourne will continue to be crush-loaded as their populations swell by the millions, placing extreme further pressure on infrastructure and housing, and destroying living standards for incumbent residents.

Comments

And cue all the “decentralise” idiots. Not going to happen, too expensive and just another form of can kicking. Brisbane and the other capitals will just wind up looking like Sydney and Melbourne in 10 years time. I’ve also never understood the clowns who go “just cut immigration now and allow infrastructure to catch up then start it again” thus leading us back to square one.

Further to that WA doesn’t have the water and is in a recession, SA, NT and Tas don’t have the jobs. Let’s just cut it and get on with the job.

The ABC’s cries of immigration helping to stem the decline in rural locations is just the Progressive’s version of Trickle Down economics, but instead of wealthy peoples tax cuts trickling down to the average worker, here they assume that by flooding our cities with massive levels of immigration, some of these new immigrants will “trickle out” to regional areas.

‘In general, half (50%) of Skilled Program migrants aged 15 years and over were employed full-time compared with 35% of Family Program migrants and 17% of Humanitarian Program migrants. Almost a fifth (18%) of Skilled Program migrants were employed part-time. In comparison, in the 2006 Census, 37% of the Australian population aged 15 years and over were employed full-time and 17% were employed part-time.

People who are ‘not in the labour force’ may be retired, attending an educational institution, have a short term or long term health condition, or could be caring for another family member or caring for children. Skilled Program migrants were less likely to be ‘not in the labour force’ (23%) when compared with Family Program migrants (36%) and Humanitarian Program migrants (57%). By way of comparison, in the 2006 Census, a third (33%) of the Australian population was ‘not in the labour force’.

The unemployment rate for Skilled Program migrants in 2006 was 7.3%. In comparison, in the 2006 Census, the unemployment rate in the Australian population was 5.2%. In general, half (50%) of Skilled Program migrants aged 15 years and over were employed full-time compared with 35% of Family Program migrants and 17% of Humanitarian Program migrants. Almost a fifth (18%) of Skilled Program migrants were employed part-time. In comparison, in the 2006 Census, 37% of the Australian population aged 15 years and over were employed full-time and 17% were employed part-time.

People who are ‘not in the labour force’ may be retired, attending an educational institution, have a short term or long term health condition, or could be caring for another family member or caring for children. Skilled Program migrants were less likely to be ‘not in the labour force’ (23%) when compared with Family Program migrants (36%) and Humanitarian Program migrants (57%). By way of comparison, in the 2006 Census, a third (33%) of the Australian population was ‘not in the labour force’.

The unemployment rate for Skilled Program migrants in 2006 was 7.3%. In comparison, in the 2006 Census, the unemployment rate in the Australian population was 5.2%. “

I think the average Aussie would be horrified by how many people we bring in who have serious disabilities or are aged or caring for a family member and there’s really no expectation except they’ll be on a pension in public housing for the rest of their lives.

“It’s just about: what is the input of population going to do to Scott Morrison’s bottom line when he talks about the growth number in the Budget.

I have been inside the room when they have talked about the population number, and it is just a ratcheting device for the bottom-line. There is no considered population analysis. There’s no thought about where these people are going to live. How they are going to integrate…”

And established white flight as anglos dont want to be in a minority at school, in their neighbourhood. Anglos are being ethnically cleansed just like the tibetans that the left cries about. Get used to more of it. Only thg that will stop it is ww3 global pandemic or major economic crash. For me i am making plans. I dont want to b a minority – give it time anglos it will happen here

A lot of the migrants are up to their eyeballs in debt, they’ll get wiped out in a recession. This also happened in Spain, Ireland, etc. While I don’t disagree with you on the anglo thing, I think it’s worse at the moment because Australia doesn’t know what recession really looks like.

I was living in Melbourne until recently and the city centre was Mumbai and Beijing rolled into one. Then there’s Box Hill and Tarneit.

Literally in london there were hardly any native white britains when i visited in 2005 The only whities were aussies kiwis and saffas and the odd eastern euro. In the capital of the uk!! Enoch was an optimist in his predictions

@DrSmithy the last census in 2011 found London at less than 45% white. Considering their large immigration since then the situation would not have seen that future stabilise. It was 58% in 2001.

In 2016 residents originally from India dominate ten of the capital’s 32 boroughs while Londoners born in Nigeria, Poland, Turkey and Bangladesh have the highest numbers in at least three areas each.

Brent and Haringey have the highest proportion of foreign-born residents at 53.3 per cent, followed by Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster, on 51.8 per cent and 50.9 per cent respectively, according to the Mayor of London’s Data Store.

Experts believe that the number of foreign-born people living in London will outnumber native Britons by 2031, based on predictions from the 2011 census. The issue is many of the next generations of native born Britons don’t see themselves as British.

Analysis of the last census also revealed that more than 600,000 white British Londoners left the capital in a decade. Between 2001 and 2011 the level reached 620,000.

I think people would be horrified if they realised the degree of dependency and entitlement shared by many migrants.

Very heavy users of the public health system
Very high rates of drug abuse
Very high rates of mental health issues – which is difficult to dissect out from drug use, and they frequently co-exist
Very high rates of crime. Often drug related. And Mental Health issues are used as an excuse to escape prosecution (or at least receive leniency).

And who is to blame for all these problems? Australia of course. Not enough jobs. Not the right jobs. Police picking on them. Discriminated against by the system.

I’m sorry to say this. But there is a reason these countries are all S#%&holes. Because people there don’t work, don’t contribute to the system, and instead take whatever they can from the system. So these countries have no real system.

And so people want to leave – to where someone is contributing to the system.

And we are importing these people and their mindset and their way of life.

Case in point. Middle aged Lebanese seriously injured in a car accident in Lebanon. Spent several months in a Beirut hospital. Somehow he was accepted as immigrant to Australia. His family took him from hospital in Beirut to airport. Arrived in Sydney, Within 24 hours he turned up to hospital requesting ongoing care of his substantial injures.

Do feel sorry for him? Of course. But should not he be treated and looked after in the country where he worked, paid tax, and was injured? He will never work another day in his life. And all out children will be paying for his care, and supporting his family.

Any fool knows that if you have a welfare system you’ll be a magnet for 3rd world immigration. And you can’t blame the immigrants — who wouldn’t want free housing, free world class healthcare, free education and various other handouts?

Witness all the Syrians, Afghanis, Somalis etc flooding into Europe recently and demanding to go to Germany or Sweden. None of the other countries was “good enough” i.e. their welfare systems were inadequate.

“The second and third generations of the ’76 arrivals [of Muslim Lebanese] are over represented in two places — the prison system and Centrelink. Bikie gangs are recruiting and in some cases, being overrun by Lebanese Muslims…”

The ABC is saying 187,000 migrants or 14% of the incoming migration total “settled in regional areas” between 2011 and 2016.
What they failed to point out is that this “flow” is not a “net” figure. Many thousands of migrants leave the regions after a few years and head to Melbourne/Sydney/Brisbane. Including the thousands of indentured overseas born and trained medical personnel who, once their compulsory tenure in the regions is finished, can’t wait to get away from the “regions” and move to their cultural enclaves in the big cities. To cities that already have an oversupply of doctors, massive increases in the number of procedures and visits to medical practices with consequential cost blowouts to Medicare.

“”But still, it is vital that even the most dangerous ideas are debated — if only so they can be exposed as idiotic and wrong.
And so here is why cutting immigration is idiotic and wrong.””……………………………..as usual his writing is full of corny attempts at humour and a failed attempt to be zany and hip. I saw he described himself as a progressive on the ABC recently. Take note Joe, nobody can take a nice salary from Mr Murdoch and be progressive at the same time.

Quite right. Progressives tend to live solely on the taxpayer teat, with a small handful in the Arts and ‘Meeja’ actually earning their keep via private means. Otherwise they’re pretty useless. If you turned them into dog-food, no dog would touch it.

Who said MB “wishes to be more mainstream and get things into the heads of dumb Australians”?

I think it is good the way it is. Only those who are not intellectually lazy will take the trouble of seeking the truth out. So it will act as a sieve – only those who deserve will benefit from this site.

Besides, among a tiny fraction of the population who come across this site, half will not understand what is written, half of the other half will not believe it, and half of those who do understand AND believe spend most of their time in front of a computer that they don’t make any difference in the real world.